LOW POWER NETWORKS SUPPLEMENT 2017
WHICH LOW POWER RADIO TECHNOLOGY SHOULD YOU CHOOSE FOR YOUR IoT DEPLOYMENT?
Sponsored by: Stream Technologies
TALKING HEADS
Low-power radio connectivity and the crucial role of the IoT-X Connectivity Management Platform With the recent emergence of an abundance of technologies and standards centred on (LPWAN) lowpower wide-area network (LPWAN) communications, the wireless connectivity aspect of the Internet of Things (IoT) value chain has become busier than ever before. With a deluge of new entrants into the LPWAN market, it’s becoming increasingly difficult for enterprises and operators to weigh up their connectivity options and determine which technology is the best fit for their needs. To get a better level of insight into the options that are available and the considerations that need to be taken into account when choosing amongst them, the managing editor of IoT Now, George Malim, spoke to three members of the team at Stream Technologies, the company behind the award-winning IoT-X Connectivity Management Platform (CMP). Nigel Chadwick, the company’s founder and CEO, Mohsen Shakoor, who leads IoT-X strategic partnerships, and Karina Maksimiuk, who leads business development for LoRa, fielded the questions
Mohsen Shakoor: LPWAN has, to some extent, become one of the largest and most interesting ‘things’ in IoT. LPWAN emerged as a result of more and more devices being connected to IoT and the need for low-power, low-cost connectivity. The sunsetting of general packet radio service (GPRS)/2G networks has also been a factor in accelerating the growth and adoption of LPWANs. The result has been that, in a relatively short period of time, a series of LPWAN technologies have emerged both on the licensed and unlicensed spectrums. Much of the early success in LPWAN can be attributed to Sigfox, providers of the Sigfox LPWAN, which operates on the unlicensed spectrum. With significant investment and marketing, Sigfox has been deployed across a number of nations. However, it should be noted that Sigfox comes with certain limitations. Since it’s a proprietary solution, deployments are limited to Sigfox networks only. This means that enterprises cannot deploy and own private networks. From a technical standpoint, Sigfox’s bidirectional capabilities are constrained, especially when compared to LoRa. That being said, where a Sigfox network is available, it serves as the right technology for use cases that require small bursts of data. LoRa is another increasingly available LPWAN technology which is being deployed globally by some mobile network operators (MNOs) and especially enterprises. LoRaWAN is governed by the LoRa Alliance, an open ecosystem which has more than 500 members including Microsoft, Cisco and Stream Technologies and is supported
by a ratified standard. It provides similar benefits to Sigfox; however, it has better support for bidirectional communications. It should be noted that LoRa only functions with hardware that’s been provided or licensed by Semtech, the organisation which developed LoRa. Every technology has certain limitations, however, when LoRa is compared to other LPWAN options, it offers the greatest degree of flexibility. Furthermore, since LoRa is an open technology, it supports the deployment of independently owned private networks. LoRa is an excellent fit for smart cities, and use cases that require bidirectional support. Sigfox and LoRaWAN both operate on the unlicensed spectrum, and serve a similar set of use cases with some overlap. There are other technologies available on the unlicensed spectrum, but they tend to be less frequently adopted than Sigfox and LoRa. Examples include proprietary LPWANs such as Ingenu’s RPMA, and Weightless. On the licensed side, Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) LPWANs such as NarrowBand IoT (NB-IoT) and Category M1 (CatM) have emerged. Largely, MNOs that choose to deploy an LPWAN will deploy a 3GPP solution, however, they still have the opportunity to offer unlicensed networks such as Sigfox and LoRa as well. NB-IoT and Cat-M compromise battery life in favour of range, and to some extent, can be seen as the GPRS/2G replacement. These technologies are the right fit for applications such as metering, tracking and use cases that require frequent transmission of data, and support devices that are connected to a mains power supply. From this we can see that several LPWAN technologies exist, each addressing similar markets, with different constraints, business
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IoT Now: Mohsen, can you give as a snapshot of the current state of LPWAN technology? What are the leading protocols and how do they fit in the IoT more broadly?
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IoT Now - October 2017
Karina Maksimiuk: When evaluating and selecting a CMP, making the wrong decision could have long lasting consequences
models and benefits. With the number of devices forecast to be connected to the IoT, many of these technologies will coexist, unlocking great potential for enterprise IoT deployments. With this comes the challenge of managing multiple technologies, carriers and systems, which will inevitably slow the adoption of the IoT. IoT Now: From what Mohsen has said, it’s clear that there’s a huge level of diversity with regards to the LPWAN market, so my question for you Nigel is, doesn’t this pose a risk that the market becomes increasingly fragmented? How does Stream foresee this diversity impacting on the IoT in general and the operators and enterprises within the industry? Nigel Chadwick: Certainly, there’s an abundance of options out there. As Mohsen touched on, the reason for the boom is driven by two factors. The first is the sunsetting of 2G connectivity. Once 2G disappears, it will leave a significant gap in the connectivity space, so it’s understandable that there’s a drive to develop new protocols that satisfy low-use, low-bandwidth IoT applications. The second factor centres on the necessity for IoT devices to maximise their battery life and hence duration in situ. With the IoT predicted to scale massively in the forthcoming years, it’s simply not practical or cost-effective to have a device estate that requires a wired power supply, constant recharging or battery replacements. When these factors are paired together, it presents sensor manufacturers with a compelling opportunity to capitalise on. From the perspective of the enterprises and operators that are assessing their options it’s inevitable that there will be some nervousness around picking the right one. In broad terms, many of the LPWAN connectivity options that are out there can serve similar use cases, so for the industry it’s a question of going with the one that they expect will have the most purchase. To some extent, it’s reminiscent of the videotape format wars of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Nobody wants to back the losing format. At Stream, we’re aware that connectivity providers are under pressure to make this decision, which is why we’ve developed
IoT Now - October 2017
Mohsen Shakoor: Many of these technologies will coexist, unlocking great potential for enterprise IoT deployments
our IoT-X CMP that’s agnostic with regards connectivity type. Originally designed to manage cellular connectivity, IoT-X has been expanded to support satellite and LPWAN connectivity. In terms of the platform’s LPWAN capability, IoT-X has supported LoRa since 2015, it’s NB-IoT ready and the design is in place to ingest data in all formats from all types of networks. The key factor here is that through our agnostic approach to connectivity, IoT-X enables cellular, LPWAN and other service providers to offer emerging wireless services to their IoT clients. With regards to market fragmentation, it’s my expectation that the market will rationalise as the IoT matures and the number of deployed devices begins to scale. Currently there are many disparate options and providers which are not always interoperable. The rationalisation of the IoT will be an interesting challenge in the LPWAN market as there is the possibility of even mature players being stressed by the 3GPP standards. IoT Now: With the multitude of connectivity options out there, it gives enterprises a lot to think about when it comes to selecting a platform that will help them to manage their connectivity. So, Karina, what are the key issues that enterprises need to consider when it comes to making this decision? Karina Maksimiuk: The first thing I’d say is that the wide range of LPWAN technologies on the market is reflected in the number of platforms that are available for enterprises to choose between. Naturally, this can be a daunting choice. There’s a critical difference between a connectivity management platform, or CMP, and other platform variants, such as application enablement platforms or analytics platforms. I’d like to focus specifically on CMPs as there’s a relatively restricted choice of these when it comes to LPWAN, and it’s an area of focus for Stream Technologies. On one hand, having the right CMP in place can add a massive amount of value to the enterprise. Not only does a CMP accelerate time-to-market, it also increases the enterprise’s ability to deliver a world-class connected product. On the other hand, there are several factors to consider when ▼
Nigel Chadwick: It’s inevitable that there will be some nervousness around picking the right connectivity option
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TALKING HEADS
evaluating and selecting a CMP, and making the wrong decision could have long lasting consequences. When it comes to making the right choice, there’s a few key factors that I’d advise any enterprise to consider. The first issue centres on the question of future proofing. We know that technology has been racing forward at a breakneck pace and the pressure of having to outpace obsolescence can be arduous. So, when it comes to choosing between CMPs an enterprise needs to have some guarantee that, as new technologies emerge, their chosen platform will keep up with the pace of change. If you choose a CMP that doesn’t deliver an adequate degree of future proofing, then you could be exposed to the risk that your connected product ends up getting stuck in a technology dead-end. In this case, the old adage rings true, “prevention is better than cure”. A truly agile IoT platform will not only be built upon open standards, but it will be committed to keeping pace with IoT technologies as they continue to morph and evolve. The second issue to consider is scalability. Having the ability to onboard existing and new devices, associate rich metadata with devices and the capability to search and filter devices based on their properties are crucial elements of any IoT solution. Implementing a handful of connected devices can be tricky, but when the number scales to many millions, or the industry’s prediction of billions of IoT devices in less than five years, the situation becomes even more complex. Having a flexible, scalable and secure backend will enable you to grow with your needs and demands. Scalability doesn’t just refer to the ability to respond to an increase in the number of connected devices, it also includes increased capacity at cloud level and device-based security. With an increased number of devices, reliability and latency are key, in addition to delivering uncompromising user experience and support.
IoT Now: So, Mohsen, how do you see LPWAN protocols impacting on CMPs? What are the challenges and how can they be overcome? Mohsen Shakoor: As I mentioned previously, there’s a wide range of platforms available, but relatively few CMPs for MNOs and enterprises in the IoT space. While many, if not most, application enablement platforms (AEPs) provide flexibility to enterprises by adopting an agnostic approach to data types, very few CMPs deliver this capability. Increasingly, global organisations are seeing the importance of CMPs, which has led to notable acquisitions of Jasper, and SORACOM, not to forget also the recent investment into Cubic Telecom. The challenge of integrating legacy systems with new technologies is not a new one. We’ve seen it before in the financial services industry, for example, where the issue of migrating legacy banking methods to more flexible, modern systems continues to pose difficulties. Integrating LPWAN connectivity to existing CMPs presents a similar challenge. Most CMPs are of a similar nature, with their primary focus being centred on cellular connectivity management. Operators are a long way down the road with CMP deployment, and consequently find it difficult to replace, or extend their existing capabilities. Traditional cellular CMPs are facing challenges on many fronts. This is not just limited to integrating embedded universal integrated circuit card (eUICC), but also with LPWAN standards. Largely, CMP providers will need to select a winning LPWAN technology, which they can develop support for. My anticipation is that this would more than likely be the 3GPP standards. Thus, leaving the operators and enterprises with the inability to deploy, or utilise the world’s most widely deployed LPWANs such as LoRa and Sigfox, through their existing CMPs. On a similar front, technology-specific CMPs exist to serve their own technology and protocol only. While this does provide the operator and enterprise with the ability to deploy and manage these specific networks, such as Sigfox and LoRa, it does not combine the traditional cellular, 3GPP LPWANs, and future technologies of tomorrow.
IoT is kind of a big deal. Do it right, and it can increase your market share and generate new revenue streams. Approach it in a haphazard fashion and the wrong move can cost you not only time but also a significant amount of money.
Picture the convenience of managing any type of technology, through a single platform as an enterprise customer with diverse IoT requirements. This is what Stream is enabling through the IoT-X platform, which delivers the enablement
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The final point I’d make is that the right CMP must accelerate your time-to-market. While exact time frames are difficult to pinpoint, a general rule of thumb is to allocate at least three months of field testing for simple solutions, and up to six months for more complex setups. Doing this will help you iron out any bugs, security holes or poor hand-offs before the product launches.
IoT Now - October 2017
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IoT-X is derived from a cellular connectivity management pedigree and includes rich feature sets that have evolved in accordance with demand from more than 600 enterprise client users over a 12-year period
and orchestration of connectivity across any operator or connectivity type, on a single platform. IoT Now: Nigel, what does IoT-X enable in the LPWAN sector and what are the implications for IoT scaling? Nigel Chadwick: As Mohsen and Karina mentioned earlier, there’s a whole bunch of different wireless protocols becoming available for transiting data to and from IoT devices. This includes the more traditional cellular networks, satellite and increasingly LPWAN variants; a veritable soup that includes 4G, Cat-M, NB-IoT, Sigfox, Ingenu and LoRa. Then within these we have internet protocol (IP) and non-IP types of data traffic. If you look at the existing range of CMPs, with the exception of IoT-X, they are designed and built to manage wireless connectivity of a certain type – there is no other platform out there that is agnostic towards all network types and ingests both IP and non-IP traffic. IoT-X is derived from a cellular connectivity management pedigree and includes rich feature sets that have evolved in accordance with demand from more than 600 enterprise client users over a 12-year period. These features have been expanded to include non-cellular network connectivity management. This means that users, and those deploying network types evolving now, such as LoRa, benefit from all the expertise and design functionality incorporated into the IoT-X platform by Stream. This includes the highly resilient, global backhaul network infrastructure and private access point name (APN), but also includes other features and capability unique to IoT-X, such as: • Network and device predictive analytics to provide deep analytics and risk reduction tools. These become increasingly important to IoT solutions that are scaling in terms of connected device or data transiting volumes. • Security enhancements around LoRa device deployments. As sensor and other LoRa device types scale, they need to be trusted in terms of integrity assurance from device and data
IoT Now - October 2017
perspectives. The security enhancements that Stream have developed in relation to LoRa connectivity helps to deliver this assurance. • Software defined networking (SDN) technologies that will facilitate customer defined routing. As you have probably gathered, a key aspect of Stream’s design philosophy is to simplify connectivity management as much as possible for the enterprise client and make it as easy as possible to manage data connectivity from a single user interface. This not only includes connectivity, subscription and billing management of LoRa, but extends to encompass our LoRaWAN network server within the IoT-X platform; thereby enabling enterprise, NGO, and other clients to easily manage LoRa network deployments. We are experiencing substantial interest in network management from many parts of the world – take a look at some of the case studies we have included in this issue of IoT Now. A final important feature of how IoT-X simplifies data transit management across LPWAN networks is in its third-party platform-ready state – and by this, I mean that IoT-X is pre-integrated with data applications, analytics platforms and data storage providers commonly used by IoT solution providers. This includes the likes of Microsoft Azure, IBM Watson, myDevices, ThingWorx and Amazon Web Services – not only can we easily enable pointing of data into all of these, we can multi-broadcast the data too. Ultimately Stream is future-proofing enterprise and other clients that adopt IoT-X in respect of wireless protocol types – the IoT-X platform is NB-IoT ready, and is designed to ingest data in all formats from all types of networks. Crucially, it is also future-proofing cellular, LPWAN and other service providers, in that it will allow these organisations to offer new and supplementary wireless services to their IoT clients. It is no surprise that we are experiencing high levels of interest and increasing adoption of IoT-X from these service providers – it is powerful enabling software/infrastructure and time-proven beyond pretty much anything else on the market.
www.streamtechnologies.com
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LPWA
Simple solutions create complex connectivity choices for IoT service providers Too much choice can be a dangerous thing but, the vast diversity of IoT applications and business models depend on appropriate functionality being available at varying price points. George Malim examines the options
At the high end of the market place, satellite communications can be used to assure universal coverage but this is not suitable for a massmarket with continuous communications needs. LTE, and much later 5G, don’t have complete coverage and, while the security and bandwidth attributes are attractive, the cost isn’t. This leaves providers of mass market, high volume, low value IoT services looking outside satellite and high-end cellular communications to find the right connectivity to support their offerings. A relatively new wave of options in low power radio and the lower reaches of the cellular range is emerging. Principal among these are three groups of technologies: LPWAN, NB-IoT and Wi-SUN. Each has its advantages, although NB-IoT and Wi-SUN are in their infancy. The challenge therefore for users is to identify which technology most closely serves their customers’ needs and the goals of their businesses. “You cannot compare a set of usage of one company to the set of usage at another company in another industry,” says Christophe Fourtet, the founder and scientific director of Sigfox, an LPWAN technology with operations globally. “It’s a very long process to compare these technologies but we’ve been trying to
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accelerate it. Since the beginning of Sigfox we’ve had the same target of shooting for the massive low-cost IoT market. Instead of being focused on technology and performance, we have aimed more for an extremely simple device that costs very, very little so you can deploy massively.” The decision also hangs on your role in the market place. Are you a user or a deployer? “There are two perspectives to consider, one relating to organisations deploying radio technologies and the other those adopting or using them,” says Ken Figueredo, an IoT strategy industry advisor to InterDigital. “The first category applies to network operators or connectivity service providers. Their legacy investments and technology roadmaps govern their decision process. In practice, connectivity service providers will see demand for hybrid solutions that combine different approaches due to the heterogeneity of end-user needs.” The number of issues to be considering is significant. “Which technology to select depends on many questions,” acknowledges Phil Beecher, the chairman of the Wi-SUN Alliance. “What is the reliability you need? What security? What latency and do you need local control? should all be considered. Another consideration is the business model. Do you want to spend capital on equipment and manage the network yourself or do you prefer an opex model? That will decide organisations between LoRa, NB-IoT or third party LoRa.” “One of the fundamental differences between WiSUN and the others is that Wi-SUN can be configured as a mesh network and it can also support faster data rates and lower latency,” Beecher explains. “LoRa and NB-IoT offer hub and spoke connectivity but we support mesh so
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LTE, 5G, Cat M1, Cat 1, satellite, low power wide area networks (LPWANs), narrowband IoT (NBIoT), Sigfox, Bluetooth, ethernet and more, the list of connectivity options for serving Internet of Things (IoT) applications and services appears to be almost endless. However, the decision about which to select is simplified by the nature of the market. Some technologies are simply too costly, too slow, too unreliable, too power hungry or just unavailable to support the needs of applications and their business models.
IoT Now - October 2017
IoT apps rely on radio but not as we know it
Neal Forse, the chief executive of WND UK, the UK’s Sigfox network operator, urges caution: “Any organisation considering these competing radio technologies, first needs to evaluate the landscape as it exists today. NB-IoT is not yet commercially available, and will likely not be until 2018 and even later in the US. For businesses looking to design and deploy their devices and solutions in the here and now, this narrows the field of competition somewhat. Even when NBIoT is ready for prime time, it will take months, if not years, in order to reach the same level of maturity as some of the competing LPWAN technologies on offer.” “Sigfox has first mover advantage in that there is already a wide range of successful deployments and the technology has a rapidly growing ecosystem of partners,” says Forse. The decision process comes down to matching the technology to the organisation’s business drivers. “In the case of firms adopting and embedding connectivity technology into their products and services, the decision is not a purely technical one,” adds Figueredo, pointing out that other factors influence the process including: • The business case Is there an acceptable return on investment (ROI)? What is the business risk from locking into a given standard and supplyside ecosystem? • Market timing Is it important to get to market quickly, possibly using a proprietary approach,
IoT Now - October 2017
with an acceptable risk if the technology needs to be exchanged or upgraded at a later point in time? • Capacity building What internal competencies will an organisation need to support connected product or service offerings without amassing significant investments and personnel or technology-partner risks? Companies thinking about their IoT deployments could be forgiven for glancing at the technologies and concluding the offerings, aside from the technological debate, are largely similar and the decision should be simply one of selecting the technology that offers the best coverage at the lowest price.
“In the case of firms adopting and embedding connectivity technology into their products and services, the decision is not a purely technical one”
“It’s definitely more complex than that,” explains Fourtet. “If you make a bet on a public network, and I believe that’s almost the only way for massive IoT, the resources that provide the service to your devices so the cost is as low as possible have to share infrastructure. It’s a mistake to think you can succeed with a private network outside of very high value scenarios.” Figueredo acknowledges functional similarity but points to the differences in the details. “The basic functionality of different low-power, wide-area IoT radio technologies is similar – they support long service-life devices and low data rate connectivity at low price points compared to traditional mobile connectivity technologies,” he says. “Individual technologies, both proprietary and standards-based, vary in the way they work whether in terms of duty cycles, data transmission characteristics, upgrade capabilities or other factors. Operational characteristics could affect how a commercial service is delivered and
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you can have local control. Local devices can communicated with a local route so you can run local actuators. In addition, the higher data rates can also support security negotiation.”
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LPWA
“Over the medium to long term, we expect module price differentials to narrow such that scale and service capabilities dominate”
Ken Figueredo, InterDigital
should be one consideration in the technology selection and product and service design process.” Forse refutes the argument that the technologies offer broadly the same functionality. “The solutions are in fact vastly different,” he says. “For a start, NB-IoT is a cellular technology, operating in the licensed spectrum, whereas Sigfox and LoRaWAN are not. Both cellular and non-cellular have their own unique value propositions and each can fulfil use cases that the other cannot. NB-IoT works – or will work, when it is marketready – best for applications that require minimal latency, high throughput or highly frequent communication. Technologies like Sigfox are ideally suited to applications that need to be delivered at a very low cost, have less frequent communication requirements, and require exceptional battery performance.” There will probably be a harmonisation among the different types of LPWA providers that will ultimately make the market less bewildering to navigate but there is a long way to go in terms of brining clarity to the market place. “NB-IoT involves the costs of managed spectrum and the mobile network operators will have some control over the size and deployment of the network while, with LoRa you just don’t know how many nodes are going to be deployed and how, if they are densely packed, they will start interfering,” says Beecher. “Wi-SUN fits nicely in the middle of the segment because our lowest data rate is way above that of Sigfox and goes up to LTE Cat M. Wi-SUN still needs backhaul and some of that will be fibre.” The differences in performance and other attributes between the technologies mean they are likely to co-exist, although the proponents of each are keen to enforce the advantages of their offerings. “If it were the case of simply selecting a technology based on cost, Sigfox would win hands down each and every time,” says Forse. “Sigfox has the lowest cost radio modules, by a significant margin. If we look specifically at LoRaWAN versus Sigfox, there are some important differentiators here too. LoRa does not provide a network to its customers. The LoRa Alliance has developed the standard and the business model is focused on selling chips.” “That means if you want to use LoRa for your devices, you either have to create your own
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Neal Forse, WND UK
Phil Beecher, WiSUN Alliance
network, managing the gateways and backend yourself or use a network operator that offers LoRaWAN networks,” he claims. “The former requires significantly more investment and expertise to instantiate and then manage the Lora gateways and the associated cloud backend, while the latter limits the geographical reach, as each LoRaWAN operator has a separate geographically isolated network; none of which share the same OSS (operations support system) or BSS (business support system) infrastructure.” Figueredo thinks that the sheer scale of the IoT market means there’s room for everyone and organisation will value having the choice of solutions that more closely target their needs. “In the short-to-medium term, each of the different technologies will co-exist because the IoT market is massive,” he says. “As a result, there will be user segments that value different commercial, operational, supplier ecosystem and technical characteristics.” “Over the medium to long term, we expect module price differentials to narrow such that scale and service capabilities dominate,” Figueredo adds. “It is therefore important for the designers of radio modules and the network operators or service providers to build up their service enabler capabilities to manage LPWA endpoints, to support new uses of these endpoints via functional enhancements, and to manage hybrid deployments that integrate more than one connectivity technology.” Even competitors acknowledge the different value propositions of rival technologies. “The other technologies have a place,” agrees Beecher. “If you want ultra-low transmission power, rather than low energy usage, LoRA is very successful because its very high sensitivity can achieve large range for given transmission power but there are regulatory restraints on power in unlicensed spectrum.” Today, the benefits and advantages of each technology are yet to be fully crystallised – in all markets at least some of the options are currently unavailable and in some they may never be offered because of regulatory constraints. This is creating some bewilderment among IoT pioneers, many of which are not experts or even interested in wireless technologies. Nevertheless, as the market matures, having options that closely fit requirements will be an important enabler for many IoT business cases. ▼
Christophe Fourtet, Sigfox
IoT Now - October 2017
“It’s impossible to simply compare the technical specifications of these competing technologies on paper and choose a winner, because requirements in the real-world change on a case-by-case basis”
“Choice promotes competition and innovation, both of which benefit the IoT industry and organisations seeking to build affordable connected products and services,” points Figueredo. Forse sees the messages becoming clearer but different technologies continuing to exist and provide choice. “It’s impossible to simply compare the technical specifications of these competing technologies on paper and choose a winner, because requirements in the real-world change on a case-by-case basis,” he says. “There will of course be winners and losers in the race to provide IoT infrastructure, but there is also plenty of space for coexistence. In fact, a coexistence of
technologies will be essential if IoT is going to be a true success.” A note of caution is injected by Fourtet who warns that, even if all the choices and the planned developments come to fruition, not all business cases will be able to be supported. “It’s not for me to answer but there is probably already too much choice,” he says. “More than this, players aren’t constructively thinking about what they do. Some think everything is possible – it’s not. If you have a rich content application you’re limited by capacity, maybe not the cost, but there are basic Physics facts that mean you won’t be able to do everything.”
Which technology should you choose? In the current IoT market place there are several IoT network wireless technologies to choose from. These include low power wide area networks (LPWAN), which have several proprietary iterations including Sigfox and LoRaWAN, cellular connections in the GSM mobile telephony family, now with dedicated versions such as Cat M1 for IoT and the emergent narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) specification. In addition to these further options include wireless smart ubiquitous network (Wi-SUN) technology and traditional satellite communications, Bluetooth and derivatives of Wi-Fi. We have confined our technology profiles below to the technologies that utilise radio technologies to deliver bandwidth at lower capacity than GSM cellular options.
NB-IoT Narrowband IoT is a new mobile technology specification developed by the 3GPP standards body to address the need in IoT for low power and infrequent data transmission devices. NB-IoT can operate in the GSM spectrum or utilise an unused resource block within an LTE carrier’s existing guard-band. NB-IoT compliant chipsets are now becoming available but they are new to market and still in the prototype stage. 3GPP has not announced plans for an NBIoT certification programme yet. Certification programmes with cellular companies have involved high fees in the past but no details are currently available. NB-IoT particularly in Europe is being seen as an important successor to 2G networks, which are starting to be retired.
LoRaWAN LoRaWAN is a proprietary low power radio technology developed by Semtech but licensed for global use by other vendors. The technology is supported by the LoRa Alliance,
IoT Now - October 2017
which provides certification for vendor interoperability. LoRaWAN radios are commonly used in low power devices with infrequent data transmissions. LoRaWANs are typically laid out in star topology with gateways relaying messages between end-devices anda central network server.
Sigfox Sigfox is a narrowband – or ultra-narrowband – technology. It uses a standard radio transmission method called binary phase-shift keying (BPSK), and it takes very narrow chunks of spectrum and changes the phase of the carrier radio wave to encode the data. This allows the receiver to only listen in a tiny slice of spectrum which mitigates the effect of noise. It requires an inexpensive endpoint radio and a more sophisticated base station to manage the network. The technology is therefore suited for connecting lowenergy objects such as electricity meters, smartwatches and washing machines, which need to be continuously on and emit only small amounts of data.
Wi-SUN Wireless smart ubiquitous network (Wi-SUN) is a technology based on the IEEE’s 802.15.4g standard. Backed by the Wi-SUN Alliance, Wi-SUN has a third party organisation that develops tests to certify that IEEE 802.15.4g standard-based IoT equipment is both conformant and interoperable with other certified equipment. Wi-SUN networks support star and mesh topologies, as well as hybrid star/mesh deployments, but are typically laid out in a mesh topology where each node relays data for the network to provide network connectivity. Wi-SUN networks are deployed on both powered and battery-operated devices.
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CASE STUDY
Real-world networks for real-world solutions As part of an ongoing commitment to accelerate the growth and adoption of Internet of Things (IoT) technology, Stream Technologies has deployed an array of incubator LoRa networks throughout the UK. With incubator networks deployed in Glasgow, Liverpool and London, Stream is providing an entryway into LoRa technology and encouraging collaboration between industry experts, academics and enterprises. In line with the company’s objective to nurture the development of LoRa technology and foster growth throughout the industry, Stream’s incubator networks are entirely open to organisations who want to develop LoRa applications and test them in a real-world environment
1. Since it was designed specifically with IoT in mind, LoRa provides exactly the kind of communication capabilities that smart devices need. The part of the radio spectrum used by LoRa presents little electromagnetic interference, this means that signals can travel long distances and penetrate buildings, using very little power. 2. Depending on urban density, the transmission range of LoRa devices can extend to up to 15 kilometres, with device battery life in the region of ten years. This is ideal for IoT devices, which often have limited battery capacity. 3. To enable secure communications, LoRa incorporates multiple layers of encryption at the network, application and device levels. 4. The LoRa Alliance, of which Stream is a member, is working to ensure that there is interoperability between LoRa networks.
Why LoRa? Stream is supporting the development of LoRa technology because it’s the ideal fit for a wide-range of IoT use cases, ranging from smart cities and smart campuses to agriculture and industry. LoRa, developed by Semtech, is a wireless technology that supports long-range, low-power IoT communications.
LoRa use cases Stream’s incubator networks are being harnessed by enterprises, start-ups and academic organisations as they develop and test LoRa-based applications. Stream’s testbeds are open to public and private sector organisations and enable the development of a wide-range of applications to support smart cities,
smart campuses and smart airports. Some of the use cases that Stream’s networks are being used to develop solutions for include: • Smart metering The smart metering industry stands to benefit enormously from LoRaWAN technology. Since smart metering applications transmit low amounts of data, they are an ideal candidate for low-bit rate, low-power LoRa devices. While cellular connectivity usually incurs a monthly charge for line rental and data, LoRaWAN devices are much more cost-effective to use. Thousands of smart meters can communicate with a single LoRa gateway up to 15 kilometres away, depending on urban density, with the geographical distribution of smart meters being supported by LoRa’s long-range functionality. Stream expects LoRaWAN to be used to deliver robust applications that add great value to smart meter operators, bringing reliability, accuracy and efficiency to smart metering solutions. • Smart parking The operational costs associated with parking infrastructure can be significantly reduced with a simple LoRaWAN smart parking deployment. LoRa sensors can be used to report on parking space occupancy, with the data being delivered in real time to the operator via Stream’s LoRaWAN network server. With real-time parking occupancy data, operators can direct drivers to empty parking spaces. ▼
Key facts
For many organisations and individuals, developing IoT projects in real-life conditions can prove challenging. For example, developing and testing smart city applications can be prohibitively expensive because of the lack of openaccess testing environments available. Developers in this field require consent from multiple parties, dedicated hardware, specialised software and network technology, as well as estates in which to create an effective test environment. This results in a heavy strain on finance and time. Stream’s incubator networks are designed to stimulate the development of IoT sensors and applications and to address the challenges of developing smart city solutions in real-life conditions.
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Newport in the UK has deployed a city-wide LoRaWAN
LoRaWAN smart parking applications can also be used to increase staff productivity. For example, rather than ticket officers patrolling specific routes, their routes can be optimised to prioritise the most populated parking areas. Local authorities can use the revenue gained from reduced operational costs and increased profits to fund other schemes, such as waste management solutions.
• Activating and terminating devices. • Setting up and managing LoRa applications. • Routing data on to third-party applications, using transmission control protocol (TCP), hypertext transfer protocol secure (HTTPS) or MQ telemetry transport (MQTT).
LoRaWAN network server • Smart waste collection Smart waste management solutions, supported by LoRa, offer an opportunity to make cost savings and improve environmental and social conditions. LoRa sensors can be mounted in waste containers to measure the bin’s fill-level. Thousands of sensors can communicate with a single LoRa gateway and, through Stream’s LoRaWAN network server, the fill-level data is routed to the appropriate platform for analytics and archiving. Forwarding the data on to a thirdparty endpoint for analytics purposes allows valuable business logic to be applied to the data, enabling a true return on investment. With fill-level data of the waste containers, operators can significantly optimise productivity. Waste collection trucks can be directed to prioritise bins that are full, rather than emptying all bins with equal frequency. This can significantly reduce the number of waste collection trucks that are deployed and reduce labour costs, leading to substantial reductions in operating costs.
Stream’s incubator networks are supported by the company’s robust LoRaWAN network server, which decodes the data received from devices by LoRa gateways and enables it to be routed via IoT-X or forwarded to a third-party application such as Microsoft Azure, PTC ThingWorx, IBM Watson IoT or scriptr.io. Stream’s LoRaWAN server has been integrated to function with LoRa compliant gateways from leading hardware providers such as Kerlink, Link Labs, MultiTech or any device using the Semtech packet forwarder. Stream is constantly integrating more ecosystem partners to ensure sound interoperability between product offerings.
Secure connectivity Stream’s networks provide secure, end-to-end encryption of traffic on the network. This is achieved by implementing LoRaWAN AES-128 (Advanced Encryption Standard) encryption for the communication. When data is forwarded to third-party applications, Stream provides transport layer security (TLS), thus ensuring data is encrypted end-to-end.
Commercial deployments Key features of Stream’s incubator networks Stream’s incubator networks are entirely open and free to use. Working with partners in Glasgow, Liverpool and London, Stream has deployed all the infrastructure necessary to provide comprehensive network coverage to these cities. Using the latest hardware and most recent LoRaWAN specification, Stream’s networks enable developers to test their applications in a real-world environment, including the ability to access location information without the need for GPS.
Connectivity management Incubator network subscribers gain trial access to Stream’s award-winning IoT-X connectivity management platform. IoTX provides network subscribers with an unrivalled level of connectivity management and puts them in control of all aspects of IoT connectivity, regardless of network technology type. IoT-X allows subscribers to perform actions such as:
While Stream’s incubator networks are supporting the development of future LoRa applications, the company has also deployed numerous networks that are being used for commercial purposes. For example, earlier this year Stream worked with Pinacl, a UK-based systems integrator, to deploy a city-wide LoRaWAN network in Newport, Wales. This project marked a significant undertaking for Pinacl, which was investing in the network to support a customer of strategic significance. As a result of working with Stream, Pinacl has been able to deploy a cutting-edge LoRaWAN network in the city. The ability of Stream’s IoT-X platform to handle multiple communication methods from LoRaWAN gateways, including cellular and fibre, was paramount to Pinacl’s smart city strategy. This provided Pinacl with the maximum choice and flexibility on gateway locations and appropriate backhaul connectivity and lead to significant cost avoidance with regards to connectivity costs. Pinacl’s partnership with Stream will continue to deliver value into the future, as Pinacl on-board more smart cities.
For further information contact info@stream-technologies.com or call +44 (0)844 800 8520. www.stream-technologies.com
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